Top positive review

5.0 out of 5 starsHonor next budget friendly phone. How does is it compare to the 5x?

ByBbtaon January 14, 2017

Update:I am changing the review to 5 stars. After few more days of use: the 6x clearly outranks the 5x in design (which is growing on me), WiFi and cell reception, performance and battery life.

Honor 5x was the first true “budget” smart phone. Metal design and fingerprint sensor where rarely seen on any phone with close price tag at that time, are becoming more and more standard now. That being said that device had some shortfalls. The performance with the snapdragon was lacking under pressure and the EMUI android skin is not everybody’s cup of tea. Today we look at the true successor of the Honor 5x with similar price tag. How did the devices rank against each other? And are the differences worth the extra $80 or so? (Both available on Amazon now for $249 vs $169)

Un-boxing and accessoriesPretty standard boxes with nothing fancy for both. Accessories much easier to find for 5x but 6x is just launched so I am sure it will catch up. Not much to talk about here.

DesignBoth are gorgeous. I had the gold Honor 5x and now compared to the gray Honor 6x, they both look way much more premium than their price tag. You could easily mistake them for a $600 phone. That being said the Honor 6x is more round around the edges, has more mate finish on the back (both has aluminum body) and feels more comfortable to hold. Honor did improve the design but not much. Honor 6x still is marginally better.

Processor, RAM and performanceHonor 5x had the more widely known Snapdragon 617, while Honor opted for the in house Kirin 655. Honor 5x had 2 GB of RAM and 6x has 3 GB (in USA anyway). On paper, the Kirin outperforms the Snapdragon (it is actually more in line with Snapdragon 625-650). This is confirmed by multiple benchmark tests although I will not bore you with the details (easily obtainable by googling both processors). Kirin also seems more power efficient thanks to the more semiconductor size (28 nm vs 16 nm) which should translate into more less heat generation as well. How did this translate into real life performance? Both devices perform well for everyday use. You will notice a slight hiccups here and there for the honor 5x particularly when opening apps (Google maps seems to take few seconds) and this becomes more prominent when you install more apps (I had 100+ apps installed). The 6x seems to handle this much better. The lag is almost non-existent and apps open up quickly (even google maps! I hated those extra seconds of waiting on 5x when checking traffic in the morning before I head to work – no more with 6x!). Is it the new processor? Is the extra RAM? Being an in house chipset optimized more to work with the user interface? Or is it simply that devices become slower with time and the 6x will follow lead? Could be any of those, but for the time being I have to go with the 6x as a winner!One last word: my only concern regarding the 6x is the GPU (which handles the display and 3d part, gaming mostly). The GPU on the 5x is Adreno 405 – no match for much better GPUs in today’s flagships but performs OK and tried in and out. The Mali T830MP2 is not as much. They both seem to handle things comparably now but will see how the Mali handles games released a year or two from now.

ScreenBoth are gorgeous. Is this the best screen around? No. but for practical purposes both did great with a small edge for the 6x, colors seems more accurate. However, for the price range they may be the best you can get and it looks amazing for watching a movie or displaying pictures. Given the slightly higher price tag for he 6x, I would say this is a tie.

CameraBoth perform adequately. Both are poor in low light situations. Both will take OK pictures. Did the two lens format in the 6x make a huge difference? In my personal opinion, no. The second Camera is not a monochrome camera like you see in pricier phones, and mostly functions to give that nice background blurring but not much more. This seems odd as the two lens format seems to be a selling point to Honor but the phone has more to offer anyway. This is a tie.

SoftwareThis is where it gets messy. You will always hear bad things about EMUI. Let me get out of the way: It is not as bad as people make it look like. It is just different. It is somewhere in the middle of Android and iPhone and I think it took some nice features from both (I like that you can search for apps simply by swiping the home screen down like you can do on iOS). You still get the customizations of android, you get the widgets and you get the ability to run 3rd party launcher (Nova launcher seemed to make my honor 5x faster). But it is not stock android. If you like android as it is, do not go for this one. If you don’t mind Honor tweaks then I think you will do fine with both. For what it is worth, I think the EMUI is one of the best android skins to prevent battery drains – it seems well optimized.As far as comparing the two devices: while it is disappointing that Honor 6x launched with EMUI 4 on android M, we are promised an update to Android N with EMUI within weeks. Honor kept their word re updating the 5x from android 5 to 6 so hopefully they will keep their track record.This is also a tie.

BatteryHonor 5x best selling point for me was the battery. No, it will not last 2 days, 3 days or longer. No you will not get 10 hours of screen on time. But that is not what I am looking for in a phone. I am looking for a phone that can give me few hours (3-5 at least of screen on time) to check my emails and browse internet, may be the occasional game or two, and not drain itself to death when I am not using it. Basically I want a phone I can use moderately with no need to charge mid day. You would think this is easy to get but to me it was not. I tried several phones at this price range and higher since my nexus 4 died. I tried Lg g2, xperia z1 and z2, nexus 6p (yes), note 4 and Axon 7. They all had one issue or the other. My biggest problem that I do not get good reception in my work area where I spend several hours a day and this seems to suck the life out of every battery I tried. My phone would go from 100 in the morning to 40 or so while not being used but rarely. Not with Honor 5x. I finally would be able to go home with 50 – 60% + when I get home with moderate usage and 2-3 hours screen on time. It may be the software or the way honor handles the bad reception but that was why I stuck with the 5x for a year. Honor 6x seems to follow lead as well and I have no issues using it for 2 days with light use. It also lacks true quick charging but it charged to 100% in about two hours. At the price range I really do not care about the extra 30 min it seems to take when compared to, say, Axon 7 which took me around an hour and a half to fully charge. So far both devices perform well. A slight edge for honor 6x.

MiscellaneousThey both have fingerprint scanner. For all intents and purposes is it excellent and it does not get much better than this. I cannot remember last time I had to try more than once to open the device. It works while screen is off (unlike older Samsung models where screen had to be turned on manually first). The honor 6x sensor is faster than the 5xBoth are fully compatible with T mobile and AT and T. LTE is excellent: I get around 10-15 mg download speed in a major metro area. It does have band 12 on t mobileBoth have double sim, the second sim doubles as an SD card slot in both6x is reported to have an IR port but I am unable to get it to work yet! no built in remote control app.Both have the much more available USB 2 for a charger. While this may become problematic years from now for the time being, to me, this an advantage. You can use any old android charger with no need for adapters

VerdictThis is an excellent phone. I am really happy that so called mid-range phones are getting better and better each year. It will not disappoint you and will perform more than adequately for everyday use and then some more. After few more days of use the much better battery life, design and performance easily justifies the price difference. Good work Huawei!

Top critical review

Phone lasted all but 2 months. Now it doesn't charge and Huawei is no help. I sent the phone to them and was told by Huawei the phone was repaired and that it was sent back to me. Open the box to find a note saying it was damaged by water and was not repair. Phone was kept in a case and screen protector since day one, never ever wet. Called them back and they could not find a report from the repair center stating what proof they had. So basically they just denied repair to a two month old phone and that's that. Never buying a Huawei phone and would suggest you don't!

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Update:I am changing the review to 5 stars. After few more days of use: the 6x clearly outranks the 5x in design (which is growing on me), WiFi and cell reception, performance and battery life.

Honor 5x was the first true “budget” smart phone. Metal design and fingerprint sensor where rarely seen on any phone with close price tag at that time, are becoming more and more standard now. That being said that device had some shortfalls. The performance with the snapdragon was lacking under pressure and the EMUI android skin is not everybody’s cup of tea. Today we look at the true successor of the Honor 5x with similar price tag. How did the devices rank against each other? And are the differences worth the extra $80 or so? (Both available on Amazon now for $249 vs $169)

Un-boxing and accessoriesPretty standard boxes with nothing fancy for both. Accessories much easier to find for 5x but 6x is just launched so I am sure it will catch up. Not much to talk about here.

DesignBoth are gorgeous. I had the gold Honor 5x and now compared to the gray Honor 6x, they both look way much more premium than their price tag. You could easily mistake them for a $600 phone. That being said the Honor 6x is more round around the edges, has more mate finish on the back (both has aluminum body) and feels more comfortable to hold. Honor did improve the design but not much. Honor 6x still is marginally better.

Processor, RAM and performanceHonor 5x had the more widely known Snapdragon 617, while Honor opted for the in house Kirin 655. Honor 5x had 2 GB of RAM and 6x has 3 GB (in USA anyway). On paper, the Kirin outperforms the Snapdragon (it is actually more in line with Snapdragon 625-650). This is confirmed by multiple benchmark tests although I will not bore you with the details (easily obtainable by googling both processors). Kirin also seems more power efficient thanks to the more semiconductor size (28 nm vs 16 nm) which should translate into more less heat generation as well. How did this translate into real life performance? Both devices perform well for everyday use. You will notice a slight hiccups here and there for the honor 5x particularly when opening apps (Google maps seems to take few seconds) and this becomes more prominent when you install more apps (I had 100+ apps installed). The 6x seems to handle this much better. The lag is almost non-existent and apps open up quickly (even google maps! I hated those extra seconds of waiting on 5x when checking traffic in the morning before I head to work – no more with 6x!). Is it the new processor? Is the extra RAM? Being an in house chipset optimized more to work with the user interface? Or is it simply that devices become slower with time and the 6x will follow lead? Could be any of those, but for the time being I have to go with the 6x as a winner!One last word: my only concern regarding the 6x is the GPU (which handles the display and 3d part, gaming mostly). The GPU on the 5x is Adreno 405 – no match for much better GPUs in today’s flagships but performs OK and tried in and out. The Mali T830MP2 is not as much. They both seem to handle things comparably now but will see how the Mali handles games released a year or two from now.

ScreenBoth are gorgeous. Is this the best screen around? No. but for practical purposes both did great with a small edge for the 6x, colors seems more accurate. However, for the price range they may be the best you can get and it looks amazing for watching a movie or displaying pictures. Given the slightly higher price tag for he 6x, I would say this is a tie.

CameraBoth perform adequately. Both are poor in low light situations. Both will take OK pictures. Did the two lens format in the 6x make a huge difference? In my personal opinion, no. The second Camera is not a monochrome camera like you see in pricier phones, and mostly functions to give that nice background blurring but not much more. This seems odd as the two lens format seems to be a selling point to Honor but the phone has more to offer anyway. This is a tie.

SoftwareThis is where it gets messy. You will always hear bad things about EMUI. Let me get out of the way: It is not as bad as people make it look like. It is just different. It is somewhere in the middle of Android and iPhone and I think it took some nice features from both (I like that you can search for apps simply by swiping the home screen down like you can do on iOS). You still get the customizations of android, you get the widgets and you get the ability to run 3rd party launcher (Nova launcher seemed to make my honor 5x faster). But it is not stock android. If you like android as it is, do not go for this one. If you don’t mind Honor tweaks then I think you will do fine with both. For what it is worth, I think the EMUI is one of the best android skins to prevent battery drains – it seems well optimized.As far as comparing the two devices: while it is disappointing that Honor 6x launched with EMUI 4 on android M, we are promised an update to Android N with EMUI within weeks. Honor kept their word re updating the 5x from android 5 to 6 so hopefully they will keep their track record.This is also a tie.

BatteryHonor 5x best selling point for me was the battery. No, it will not last 2 days, 3 days or longer. No you will not get 10 hours of screen on time. But that is not what I am looking for in a phone. I am looking for a phone that can give me few hours (3-5 at least of screen on time) to check my emails and browse internet, may be the occasional game or two, and not drain itself to death when I am not using it. Basically I want a phone I can use moderately with no need to charge mid day. You would think this is easy to get but to me it was not. I tried several phones at this price range and higher since my nexus 4 died. I tried Lg g2, xperia z1 and z2, nexus 6p (yes), note 4 and Axon 7. They all had one issue or the other. My biggest problem that I do not get good reception in my work area where I spend several hours a day and this seems to suck the life out of every battery I tried. My phone would go from 100 in the morning to 40 or so while not being used but rarely. Not with Honor 5x. I finally would be able to go home with 50 – 60% + when I get home with moderate usage and 2-3 hours screen on time. It may be the software or the way honor handles the bad reception but that was why I stuck with the 5x for a year. Honor 6x seems to follow lead as well and I have no issues using it for 2 days with light use. It also lacks true quick charging but it charged to 100% in about two hours. At the price range I really do not care about the extra 30 min it seems to take when compared to, say, Axon 7 which took me around an hour and a half to fully charge. So far both devices perform well. A slight edge for honor 6x.

MiscellaneousThey both have fingerprint scanner. For all intents and purposes is it excellent and it does not get much better than this. I cannot remember last time I had to try more than once to open the device. It works while screen is off (unlike older Samsung models where screen had to be turned on manually first). The honor 6x sensor is faster than the 5xBoth are fully compatible with T mobile and AT and T. LTE is excellent: I get around 10-15 mg download speed in a major metro area. It does have band 12 on t mobileBoth have double sim, the second sim doubles as an SD card slot in both6x is reported to have an IR port but I am unable to get it to work yet! no built in remote control app.Both have the much more available USB 2 for a charger. While this may become problematic years from now for the time being, to me, this an advantage. You can use any old android charger with no need for adapters

VerdictThis is an excellent phone. I am really happy that so called mid-range phones are getting better and better each year. It will not disappoint you and will perform more than adequately for everyday use and then some more. After few more days of use the much better battery life, design and performance easily justifies the price difference. Good work Huawei!

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I'm really surprised what a great phone this is for $250.The battery life is the best I have ever seen, barely hitting 40% after a day of frequent use including Bluetooth audio and navigation. The processor is fast, no lag in apps. The fingerprint sensor works great. I really like the EMUI, much better notification system than the standard Android 6. Camera, reception, display - no regrets here either.Also worth mentioning: Unlike my previous Samsung, Motorola and LG phones, you can actually uninstall/remove all bloatware apps that come with the phone.Definitely recommend this thing!

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I started as an iPhone user, but I have been frustrated over the degrading quality of Apple products ever since Steve Jobs died. Believe me, I never had to reboot my iPhone before, but now I have to do it once every month or so. My review will mostly focus on the migration from iPhone 6S to Huawei Honor 6X.

(1) Most apps I had on my iPhone, I can find them in Google Play Store. The migration of contact book is seamless. Once I signed into my Google account to my Honor 6X, all my contacts were imported automatically. I didn't have to anything. I spent some time researching an Email app that most resembled the iPhone email app, but eventually decided to use the default Huawei email app. Now I am gradually used to it. Maybe the one thing I miss is the Notes app. I took some notes using this app with different email accounts, but some do not show up in my email account somehow.

(2) The battery life of Honor 6X beats the iPhone 6S easily. I used to charge after lunch and charge again before sleep. Now my phone lasts a whole day with the same usage frequency. I am very happy with it.

(3) Camera quality is excellent on this Honor 6X. I haven't used it a lot, but there are definitely more functions, such as the Pro Photo/Video mode. I probably won't be using it, but someone might appreciate this feature.

(4) Fingerprint reader is excellent compared with the iPhone. After having used the Honor 6X for a few days, I find it so much more convenient to do things such as closing an app, login to the phone. I used to use the fingerprint reader to login to my bank account apps on my iPhone, but most Android apps don't support login using fingerprint yet. (Correction: I stand corrected: Most apps do support fingerprint login with a few exceptions, one being the Fidelity app).

(5) The dual SIM feature on this phone is very appreciated. I somehow got the impression that it supports the second SIM slot and SD card simultaneously, but it does not. And only nano size SIMS are allowed in both slots. I had to cut my second SIM from micro to nano.

(6) I had Apple pay setup on my iPhone, but I have never had a chance to use it. So I am not missing that feature on the Honor 6X, which does not support NFC.

Overall, I find it quite easy to make the transition from being an iPhone user to an Adroid user with Huawei Honor 6X.

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For more coverage of this device and other similar devices check out my YouTube Channel linked in my profile.

The Honor 6X is a phone that easily outperforms it's price. As a person who owns and reviews many different phones throughout a year, I have zero hesitations in recommending the Honor 6X to anyone considering a mid-range/budget device at the beginning of 2017. This phone is by no means perfect, but it does so many things well that in some regards you would expect it to have a more premium price. I've now had my Honor 6X for 5 days, and here are my thoughts so far (Note: my video review was from day 3 of ownership):

Performance: 5/5 - The Honor 6X is being run by the Kirin 655 processor with 3gb of RAM, and it is a very snappy combination. To be honest I can't tell any difference in day to day performance of this phone with other much more expensive phones that I have used and reviewed. If you are in to benchmarks, the 6X scored a multi-score of right around 3200. Putting that aside, I can assure you that this phone will not feel like a budget phone in terms of its performance.

Build Quality: 5/5 - The Honor 6X is a very beautiful device that honestly looks like it could be a far more expensive device. It's all metal backing gives it a very premium feel and look.

Cameras: 4.8/5 - The dual cameras set upon the rear of the phone do an awesome job in both low light and of course in good lighting conditions as well. The cameras are 12mp and 2mp, and one very cool feature is that they allow you to make focal adjustments in the post-processing of the photo. In other words, you can take a photo of an object and blur out the background to give it a DSLR-like appearance to the photo. The 8mp camera also takes very solid selfie photos, but for me the rear cameras are a huge selling point of this budget device.

Battery Life: 4.5/5 - The 3340 mAh battery of the Honor 6X is an all day battery. For even a heavy user like me I was able to pretty easily get through a full day and still have around 20-30% battery. In general I'm getting around 4.5 - 5.5 hours of screen on time, but it's more useful to note that this phone will get almost any user through a full day. It should also be mentioned that the Honor 6X is a "fast charging" phone as well. It takes around 90 minutes for me to get a full charge.

Screen Quality: 4.8/5 - I've heard other YouTubers mention that the screen on the Honor 6X seems washed out, but I can tell you with confidence that the screen looks great, and it also gets bright enough to see in direct sunlight. It is a 1080p screen at 403 ppi, and for the average phone user, this pixel density is more than enough.

What's missing: The Honor 6X doesn't have NFC, and it also doesn't have support for dual band wi-fi. Most home wifi users are not on dual band wifi, but if you are, you will need to use 2.4ghz for the Honor 6X. Another negative is that the Honor 6X is using a slightly outdated charging cord with micro usb. This is probably what most phones out there are still using, but Type C is shipping out on even a lot of budget friendly devices now, so it's surprising that the Honor 6X doesn't use Type C.

Conclusion: I have absolutely no reservations in recommending the Honor 6X. It is a fantastic budget device that cuts very few corners to be at this low of a price point.

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This phone is great, the camera is outstanding for the price, and it runs smoothly, the speakers are good and they can be very loud so that's good, works with VR to an extent, the gyroscope has slow reaction speed and shaking screen sometimes some vr apps work fine and some don't, this leads to a fun but annoying VR experience, I wouldn't put a whole lot of money into a VR headset for THIS phone, the fingerprint sensor is very speedy and fairly accurate as long as you configure it right, overall this is a great phone.

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Plug and play with T-Mobile. I used the 5x version and this one has much better battery life. The picture quality is about the same though I will say that I took the 5x to Europe last year and took excellent pics. You can either choose to pay less than $200.00 for a high quality phone or hundreds of dollars for a phone that does the same as this one. Huawei is unknown in the US but I saw plenty of advertisements in Europe which if you have never been there, the small stores usually only offer name brand or higher quality than in American stores. Just saying.

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I waited over a month before leaving this review so that I could get used to the phone. First I should say that this is my first Android phone. I was using a Lumix 640xl Windows phone before. The only thing I miss about my Windows phone is Cortana. Honor can you make me a Cortana assistant for EMUI 5.0???

Okay now onto the phone. First I love the fingerprint reader. The placement is great and it works great. The cameras work fine for me, they aren't equivalent to my Nikon DSLR, but who cares it's a phone not a professional camera. The dual rear cameras are neat, but I haven't really found much use for the bokeh effect. The screen is much better than my old phone, sure it's not 4K UHD, but again it's a phone not a theater screen. The RAM so far has been more than sufficient, the phone operates at a speed that I would expect from any phone. Personally I don't worry about the benchmark tests, but they are pretty good if that's something you care about.

The battery is great! Two days of normal use without having to charge.

I was a bit put off by some of the issues with EMUI 4.0, but I ignored them am happy to report that EMUI 5.0 is much better.

The fit and finish of this phone are excellent, much better than what I expect from a $250 phone. It doesn't have the 5 GHz WiFi, but I never noticed a lag when on WiFi. It also doesn't have NFC, but I took this as a plus. I have never used it and I don't like the idea of someone being able to access my banking information via my phone.

If you have a need for two sims (I don't), keep in mind you won't be able to install a micro SD card, and sim 2 and the micro SD card use the same slot.

I forgot to mention at the beginning, the packaging was very nice. No huge bells and whistles, but that didn't bother me. If I want all that I will waist an extra $500 on a phone.

All things considered I am very happy that I chose the Honor 6x and in a few years I can't wait to see what Huawei comes up with.

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Forced to buy a new phone because internet services in US is incompatible to my Huawei P8 Lite from the Middle East. Honor 6X is exactly as advertised, really cheap (bought it during black friday sale) for its features and functionalities and most importantly, my cellular data now works and works fast! Phone interface could use an upgrade for any succeeding version, the firmware improvrd or increase the memory ram because i have experienced a lot of screen lag when several apps are running in the background. On the upside, never crashed (instantaneous reboot) and long battery life for the past 2 weeks that i've used it.

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Wow is all I have to say about this phone... Great bang for your buck and not to mention the phone is confirmed to be receiving Android Oreo with the latest emui... Great purchase... Oh yeah and it has a headphone jack lol.